


Stars be our Witness

by CrunchyWrites



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: First Kiss, Fluff, M/M, bed sharing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-08
Updated: 2018-02-08
Packaged: 2019-03-15 15:41:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13616463
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrunchyWrites/pseuds/CrunchyWrites
Summary: This has been a long time in the making.





	Stars be our Witness

This has been a long time in the making.

They’ve been doing this _thing_ of theirs for a while, this slow, careful dance, and one night they’re out on the road between cities, stars above them and soft grass beneath, both of them doing their own thing in the warmth of the fire with their shoulders just barely brushing. Fjord’s sharpening his blade, his armour long since discarded and placed aside, and beside him Caleb sits in silence, his long, elegant fingers brushing against yellowing pages as he scans through his latest purchase, and at some point one of his hands had fallen to Fjord’s knee.

It’s still resting there now, palms down and seeping warmth through the fabric of Fjord’s breeches, Caleb’s thumb brushing against his leg in seemingly random, absent-minding motions. Certainly, Caleb hasn’t given any sign that he’s noticed what he’s doing – he’s still just sitting, reading, occasionally lifting his hand from Fjord’s knee to turn a page or hold the book open as he careful writes in a note, but the moment he’s done his hand returns, settling back into place like it never left.

Caleb doesn’t say anything, and Fjord doesn’t either.

He doesn’t know _what_ to say, for starters, but it’s more than that. What they have is new and tentative and unnamed, something born of hope and curiosity and mutual, shared wonder, and Fjord doesn’t want to risk disturbing this fragile, delicate thing that hangs between them, so he bites back any words he may have and instead, after several long moments of deliberation, sets his whetstone to one side and places his hand atop Caleb’s.

From the corner of his eye, he thinks he sees Caleb smile.

Fjord thinks Caleb finishes reading up the chapter of the book he’s on, but he’s not certain – he’s finding it hard to focus on anything beyond the shape of Caleb’s hand beneath his own, beyond the fire-touched warmth of Caleb’s skin and the callouses that adorn Caleb’s hand; a constant reminder that Caleb’s life has not been a gentle one.

Fjord wishes he could make it a gentle one. He wishes he could give this man everything he deserves and more. But he can’t, so he doesn’t, and instead he gives what he can.

After a while – a minute, an hour, _Fjord doesn’t know_ – Caleb starts shifting himself, tucking his books back into their holsters and making motions towards bed. “I should-“ he says, shifting and stirring but not yet moving his hand from Fjord’s knee, “I should really go to bed now, Fjord…”

Caleb’s hand is still on Fjord’s knee.

Caleb’s hand is on Fjord’s knee and his blue eyes have turned amber in the firelight and his skin is warm and his hand is turning underneath Fjord’s lacing their fingers together and squeezing soft and tentative even as Caleb speaks of leaving, of going back to the small tent he shares with Nott, and Fjord really wants to kiss him but more that he really doesn’t want Caleb to go.

“Stay with me,” he says, blurting the words out, and he catches the surprised, delighted expression that flickers across Caleb’s face before it smooths into a soft, slightly uncertain smile. “Stay with me tonight,” he says again, and runs his thumb against the back of Caleb’s hand. _Please_. “It’s- it’s getting awful cold out. Wouldn’t want you to catch a chill.”

It’s a terrible excuse, an _awful_ one – they’re already well on their way into Spring – but it seems to work, because Caleb’s faint smile grows a bit stronger.

“You have a good point,” he says softly, and drops his gaze to where their joined hands lie between them. His smile grows again, and Fjord cannot entirely tell if it’s due to the warmth of the fire or the warmth of skin pressed to skin, but he thinks he sees a slight flush rise in Caleb’s cheeks.

_Gods, he looks so beautiful_.

Fjord watches as Caleb lifts his head, looks at Fjord, looks across the fire to where Nott is dozing, her heading Jester’s lap, and looks back.

“Nott’ll be okay,” Fjord reassures him, “Jester’s taken quite a shine to that girl, y’know. I can’t imagine the two menaces will mind bunkin’ up together.”

Across the fire he sees Jester lift her head with a wide grin and give the faintest of nods. _Damn trickster clerics_ , he thinks, _Always listening in_.

“Well,” Caleb says, his voice soft and thoughtful and just barely edged with quiet teasing, “I suppose that I have no reason _not_ to accept your kind offer, my friend.” He pauses, and smirks just a little. It makes him look almost unfairly attractive. “For the good of both of our health, of course.”

“Oh,” Fjord replies, grinning back in kind, “Of course. Just for our health, nothing more.” He thinks he sees Jester roll her eyes at the corner of his vision, but he doesn’t turn his head to check. Caleb is too beautiful to look away from.

They stand together, still hand in hand, and Fjord leads the way over to his small tent. It’ll be a bit of a tight fit, but they both know this already and Fjord knows that he certainly doesn’t mind, and it seems that Caleb doesn’t either. Caleb summons a globe of softly glowing light once they’re inside the darkness of the tent, Fjord watching his easy manipulation of magic enraptured as he does, and then they both strip down to their sleep clothes in silence.

Fjord’s the first into bed, of course – it’s his tent, and this was his suggestion, and so it’s not long until he’s settling down on his bedroll, pulling the blankets up to ward off the approaching chill of the night. Caleb, still fussing with his books and his coat doesn’t seem to notice for a while, but when he turns around and spots Fjord already in bed he freezes; a rabbit caught in the light of sudden uncertainty.

“C’mon,” Fjord says, and lifts the blanket up, “Scoot on in.”

For a single, heart-stopping moment he watches Caleb shift uncertainly from foot to foot, and fears he might back out.

He doesn’t.

He just says “alright,” and joins Fjord under the blankets. Fjord lets them fall again, covering them both, and beneath the blankets he reaches out one hand, settling his arm loosely around Caleb’s waist.

“This alright?” he whispers, and feels more than he sees Caleb nod, the light now extinguished.

“Yes,” Caleb says. “This is- this is fine.”

It’s more than fine, actually, if the way that Caleb shuffles in and rests his forehead against Fjord’s shoulder a few seconds later is any indication of what Caleb's thinking. Fjord freezes for a moment, not entirely sure of what to _do_ , but then Caleb sighs, and relaxes against his chest and beneath his arm and it immediately becomes so, _so_ easy to pull him in closer, to splay his hand across Caleb’s back and feel the rise and shape of his vertebrae, and then everything just… settles.

The tent is dark and silent save for the sound of their breathing, and Fjord has never felt this comfortable lying on a few blankets above lumpy, rocky earth before.

It doesn’t take long for him to start dozing off, and he’s almost fully asleep when he feels Caleb shift, and hears him speak again.

“Thank you,” Caleb says, and his voice is unusually serious even for him.

Fjord blinks in the darkness. “For what?” he asks.

“For this,” Caleb replies, and leans forwards to kiss him.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! This was just a little thing that I churned out for [americankimchi](http://americankimchi.tumblr.com/) and then tidied up for AO3, so apologies if it reads a bit awkwardly. If you have any widofjord prompts please feel free to drop by my [tumblr](https://crunchywrites.tumblr.com/ask)!


End file.
